What can be said about two directors who quite easily described as absolute masters? Ozu Yasujiro and Kurosawa Akira are two of the best at their profession that Japan has ever produced. Yet, they also have quite obvious differences in their approach and execution. After all, how can two films such as Seven Samurai (1954) and Tokyo Story (1953) be anymore different? Despite the mere year that separate the release of the two films, they are drastically different on any number of themes, yet the differences between them also highlights the intrinsic distinctions that separate the two directors as well. In the calm, seemingly everyday images of Tokyo Story, the viewer realizes Ozu’s vision of Japanese tradition through modern means. The understated subtle emotion is the currency of the film, allowing the audience to understand the truly deep characters that Ozu masterfully creates. In contrast, Seven Samurai does not seek to portray its goals in any subtle means at all. Instead, Kurosawa presents his viewer with an intense moral question. He aims to portray his view on the societal problems of his Japan through stories of the past. In Seven Samurai, the violent, fast-paced scenes present a message that rung true in Kurosawa’s modern day Japan as well as throughout the world due to its general application. The two legendary directors had distinctly different directions that they took the films often regarded as their master pieces despite being contemporaries. As such, it seems fitting to compare and contrast them. Yet by what means should one judge them on? After all, there is any number of issues on which the two differ. Personally, I am going to judge them based upon their cinematography and mise-en scene. Ozu, often called the most Japanese director, and Kurosawa, perhaps the most internationally received Japanese director, both lead their respective films in a highly divergent and contrasting manner.
As we discussed in class, the style of Ozu Yasujiro aims to portray the everyday life of Japan. Ozu attempted to have his films be a slice out of life. Donald Richie presents this mindset when he writes in his A Hundred Years of Japanese Film:
The majority of Ozu’s stylistic means had a single end in view: the creation of a composition which satisfied him. The most traditional aims he gratified through the most modern of methods. Experimenting and refining, watching Western films, absorbing influences everywhere, Ozu was also, in his own way, concerned with a type of traditionalism. This is not only true of his subject matter (throughout his career he only had one serious theme: the dissolution of the traditional Japanese family) but also of his way of working with it. (58-59)
Richie describes a very important element to Ozu’s works: the traditional message that he crafts despite working within modern means. He does this by constructing a unified composition. This is indeed a very common thread of Japanese culture. All manner of things are presented in a unified view be it gardens, the theater, or in Ozu’s case film.
Yet, how does Ozu achieve this composition which he strives for? It is cinematography and mise-en scene which allow him to perfect his vision. First and foremost, this represented by Ozu’s use of the low-angle shot, or the kneeling shot. He uses this tool for almost all of Tokyo Story, which provides a decent picture of Ozu’s motives. The perspective created by the low-angle shot works perfectly with the film’s focus on family conversation in the traditional kneeling position. It allows the viewer to be put into the perspective of those conversing. To put the importance of this angle into perspective, I cannot imagine the scene of Tomi and Noriko’s conversation without it. It just simply would have not felt correct. The low angle shot also has other effects as well. Donald Richie addresses this in an article on I Was Born, But… (1932) when he says:
The low camera position fills all but two shots with sharp diagonals, and these (thanks to Ozu’s constant crossing of the axis of action) lend not only greater depth to the space but also greater graphic play to the compositions. Each shot is a neat, almost fussy composition, locking each character into a separate space. (228)
In other words, Ozu’s favored shot allows the composition to be that much more dynamic. It creates a great depth coupled with the ability to set up the actors in the ways which Ozu prefers—side by side in seemingly the same position.
This quote out of Richie’s article brings up another facet of Ozu’s cinematography repertoire—his failure to abide by the American 180-degree line. Instead, Ozu uses what some have dubbed 360-degree space. Ozu has no problem cutting across the 180-degree line if he believes it is necessary to his composition. This can be seen in Tokyo Story in the very beginning. We see Shukichi and Tomi packing for their trip to Osaka and Tokyo to visit their children. At first, they are viewed as facing right while sitting next to each other. However by the end of the sequence, the audience is moved across the 180-degree line so that we now see the couple facing to the left. Whereas many Western directors found this to be too confusing for the audience, Ozu uses it to explore the set around the characters creating a greater sense of exactly where they are. As said by David Desser in his Ozu’s Tokyo Story, “Careful examination of the individual setups reveals that Ozu rarely shoot a scene in a master shot.” (15) Ozu’s camera is always moving, exploring the area, giving the audience continually new perspectives.
Finally, we find Ozu’s achievement of his intended composition through his command of his actors. To say that actors and Ozu had an odd relationship would be a quite an understatement. As Ozu said when referring to his later works: “You won’t find any particularly new techniques except for the elimination of acting.” (122) Ozu held a complete dominance over those acting for him. He demanded the execution of exactly what he described, going so far as to tell actors that they would have a certain number of seconds to perform an action. He would simply continue filming until the actor did his task perfectly. Generally, Ozu had them act in a calm restrained manner as that is what he envisioned the normal Japanese way to be. Likewise in their movement, he restricted how much the actors could move. In his Currents in Japanese Cinema, Tadao Sato says that, “Ozu manipulated his players like puppets but he created scene of incomparable, formal beauty, though they lacked in vitality.” Ozu uses subdued acting to convey his message to the viewer. Instead of having bold movements be that which is noticed, he forces us recognize the small features which are so crucial to his films.
In contrast to Ozu, Kurosawa Akira has a decidedly different approach to filmmaking. He did not focus upon the composition of the shot to the extent that Ozu labored over it. Instead, Kurosawa generally discussed Japanese societal problems in his films. However as opposed to directly confronting the problem, he often liked to use a historical background to make his point. This is the case in Seven Samurai as well as in many of his other films such as Rashomon (1950). To create the social critiques which he desired, Kurosawa had to be rather inventive, constantly exploring new ways to express his goals. The ever relevant Donald Richie describes this as:
The way in which he is seen to do so is through a cinematic style which is as controlled as it is inventive, as incisive as it is subjective. All directors create their films in just this way—showing what they have learned both from life and from other pictures—but Kurosawa displays this with extraordinary panache. It is this genius for amalgamation which one may find typical of Kurosawa and very Japanese of him.
Kurosawa uses all the sources he can to create his vision, a fact witnessed in Seven Samurai. To create the rather epic battle scenes which constitute the climax of the film, he set up several cameras across the set so that he could fluidly transition from one camera to the next within the same shot. The end result is the beautiful final battle where the action sprawled across the entire village. It is small techniques like this which allow a Kurosawa master piece to flourish.
Perhaps the most significant, in my mind, difference between Ozu and Kurosawa in their directing styles is their use of the actors. As we stated, Ozu restricted the actors and made them bow to his will. The opposite could not be truer when referring to Kurosawa. He gave his sctor free-reign to try as they like with their parts. This can be viewed in Mifune Toshiro’s article in the Seven Samurai booklet. He says:
From the first, Kurosawa never said to do things this or that way—I got no detailed instructions. Instead, he said, “Show me what you can do.” So I was free to figure out for myself, using my own limited wisdom, how the character I was playing would act in a given situation. All Kurosawa would say was , “Yeah, that works” or “Why don’t you try it this way?”
Kurosawa aimed to harness the energy of his actors, such as Mifune, so that the energy would contribute to the overall societal picture he was attempting to create.
Kurosawa held a vastly different mindset than Ozu in regards to filmmaking because he was so flexible, willing to try anything if it would get his message across, as compared to the almost formulaic fashion that Ozu adopted. Whereas Kurosawa would try a new shot, Ozu would rely on his low-angle shot. Whereas Ozu would prearrange every action of his cast, Kurosawa would allow Mifune Toshiro to quite literally go wild in acting as he did as Kikuchiyu in Seven Samurai. It is no surprise that, with such explicitly different goals in their filmmaking, Ozu and Kurosawa’s films are so drastically contrasting.
